Scenes From The Mahabharata
by voodooqueen126
Summary: This semester I studied Indian Epics at my university. Almost every week our lecturer would ask us write a short creative piece inspired by the weeks reading. I hope these scenes inspired by RK Narayan's Mahabharata are pleasing and true to the source material.
1. Madri's Funeral Pyre

_Kunti_

This is the death of my dearest friend. Soon the woman that I laughed with and joked with will be no more. We had a curiously happy relationship for co-wives, but then with a husband like Pandu, there wasn't much to get jealous over. There had been hassles and arguments over the matter of my amazing boon-that I Kunti would have children whilst poor Madri would not, but I have always been patient. I not been patient then I wouldn't have gotten the boon in the first place-and so I shared the secret mantra with Madri, and her two beautiful boys joined my three.

Madri is brave on the funeral pyre, she does not scream as the flames envelope her, and perhaps it is the smoke inhalation. I wonder if I would have the courage to do what Madri is doing. I find myself praying that should I ever face fire, I would have an ounce of Madri's courage. The boys are inside with their nurse, this is no fit sight for boys, though the oldest Yudhisthira is thirteen, some might call him a man, but I do not want this image of his stepmother burnt into his brain. But I am here, I am watching the final moments of Madri.

She should not have slept with our husband, poor Madri, she was always beloved by our husband more than I, this never bothered me before his death, and now when I see what our husband's love it has brought her it does not bother me now.

I was more of a quiet intellectual, for though Yudhristhira is the son of Dharma, I think we share a few other traits and I am glad our husband Pandu chose him Dharma first. How strange that quiet intellectual me should be the one with three children, when usually beautiful women like Madri have all that sort of luck.

It is not strange that I will be the one to raise these three legal sons of Pandu, that's just the sort of thing that life does through at women like me. I am glad of it, I love living and being a mother and teacher to five boys like these would be the greatest life of all. For I know that my sons and Madri's are great in their own way, and that they will bring greatness to this land and I Kunti shall have played my part.

Madri has not much longer to go now, in a strange sort of way there would have been no life without Madri: her love of horses meant that we were always out going on expeditions, her love of cleanliness meant that disease was always far from our house, but it was above all her love of beauty that made life so enjoyable: Madri said that the sunrise and sunset were the most beautiful things in the world, only the stars, she said, came close. Her love of beauty expressed itself in her love of embroidering, and our house was filled with the beautiful things that she made.

As Madri dies, my heart breaks, the emptiness that Madri left, destroying the bricks and mortar of every other part of my heart.

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	2. Draupadi dragged by Duhśasana:

Draupadi dragged by Duhśasana:

_Bhima:_ Yudhisthira has failed our wife, our wife who has five husbands, yet for all that I am able to do about it, our Draupadi may as well be a widow. I cannot disobey my brother, I am already a slave, and my brother who sold himself into slavery, has bet our wife against Sakuni. I cannot speak but I must speak. I can see Duhśasana dragging my wife by her hair.

_Bhishma:_ What is this disgrace? I am sworn to serve Dhritarashtra, yet his son commits this disgrace. I can see her long hair as Duhśasana drags her across the assembly hall. She is wearing a saffron coloured sari, she is telling Duhśasana to unhand her and let her return to the women's quarters.

_Gandhari:_ I am present but cannot see, in my years of blindness I have learned to use my other senses… I think I can smell blood as my son drags his cousins' wife into the assembly hall. I am ashamed at his behaviour. I can hear her screams, and smell clotted blood. _Why is my son doing this? _He has countless wives yet why must he do this to his cousins wife? Yet I love my sons, and my brother Sakuni loves my sons also, yet he has helped my Duryodhana commit this immoral deed. I hear Draupadi's yelps, as Duhśasana pulls her by the hair, I want to speak out but cannot, I can hear the sound of her sari swishing the floor as he drags her across the marble. I can smell her blood and I am mortified.

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	3. Karna and Parasurama

_Karna_

Whilst my guru rests his head upon my lap, I meditate on my good fortune: I cannot express my joy to be finally taught the Brahmastra,to learn this thing. To defeat Arjuna, so that I can help Duryodhana, who believed in me and trusted me without question, even though I was the son of a chariot driver. When I use the Brahmastra, I will be death, the destroyer of worlds. It will be a beautiful scorching heat, unlike the awful rain that is falling now. When that death comes, all the arrogance and pride of the Pandavas will be swept away and something new and better shall take its place… From the destruction of arrogant people like Arjuna comes the clean and beautiful world of people like me. It will be a new creation and a better creation.

My guru sleeps soundly, he is an ascetic man, prickly tempered. He hates Kshatriya's though he acts like a Kshatriya…_There is no crime in lying to a hypocrite? _I tell myself as I hold his head in my lap. Still for all his hypocrisy, there is something saintly about Parasurama.

Suddenly I feel a terrible kind of tickling on my knee. I look down and I see that a centipede has crawled onto my leg and is making its way northward. My teacher has his arm flung out upon my shins and I dare not move for fear of waking him. The centipede crawls up further, it's tiny pincer like legs making their way up my skin. _It's not so bad, at least I have hairy legs. _An absurd thought, yet I know it's a mere centipede and therefore the centipede has crawled inside my dhoti and it is on my thigh _the bravest maddest centipede in existence._ It starts to bite and it is unexpectedly agonizing _the bite is demonic. _The creature continues on biting, but I will not move, I will not wake my guru, Parasurama, who is hypocritical yet saintly. I remain motionless as the demonic centipede continues on knawing at my flesh . _I will not move, I will not wake my guru, who has taught me this wonderful thing. _I look down and see that the blood has come through the dhoti and is pooling on the ground and is on my gurus ear. _There is blood in my gurus ear. _But I do not move, I will not wake him. My Guru Parasurama stirs and he looks at the blood and looks at the centipede-_demonic creature-_emerging from my dhoti and there is rage in his eyes.

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	4. The Death of Jayadratha

_Draupadi_

"Jayadratha has killed Abhimanyu" comes the cry, and I hear my heart beating, I struggle with the urge to vomit, I hold my sons close: Prativindhya is Yudhisthira's son, Sutasoma is Bhima's son, Shruthakarman is Arjuna's son (he is my favourite), Satanika is Nakula's son, and Srutasena is Sahadeva's son. To lose them would be unbearable. Subhadra is wailing, I can hear her grief, Uttara is also wailing _She is less than 16 years old and she will spend the rest of her life as a widow _My heart breaks for the young girl.

"Who killed him?" I ask

"The final blow was struck by Durmashana." says Daumya _Ah Duhshasana's son: Why does this not surprise me. _Rage boils in my stomach… _His father's blood will be the sweetest shampoo._

"But" Daumya continues "that was very much a group effort, for it is Jayadratha who made it impossible for Abhimanyu to escape the Chakravyuha."

"Jayadratha is the one responsible for Abhimanyu's death." I say it loudly so that my voice rings out and can be heard across the camp: all must know that Jayadratha is responsible, especially Yudhisthira. _If he had not cared so much for Duhsala then Abhimanyu would be alive… _Yet again Yudhisthira's unwillingness to pursue justice has harmed us… _Jayadratha abducted me in the most brutal manner and Yudhisthira thought that a mere head shave was sufficient punishment, yet because of Yudhisthira's mercy to that monster, Abhimanyu is dead. _I hold my sons closer, the thought of losing them is unbearable.

"Jayadratha is responsible for Abhimanyu's death." I am yelling now. It is the only way I can be heard above Subhadra's wailing and Uttura's cries.

_Jayadratha's humiliation and abduction of me may not have been sufficient to merit death in the eyes of my husbands, yet somehow I do not think that Arjuna will take the death of his son as easily as Yudhisthira took my abduction. All that is necessary for the triumph of evil-for the death of Abhimanyu who was loved by all-was for good men like Yudhisthira to do nothing._

"Arjuna is returning with Krishna" When Daumya says this I know that

The only way to defeat the combined forces of bad men like Duhsana and Jayadratha, is for good men like Arjuna and Krishna to associate; else good men will fall, one by one like Abhimanyu, in an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.

_Arjuna_

"I will bring about a solar eclipse" says Krishna, for Krishna, everything is possible, although he cannot bring back Abhimanyu, my son his nephew, I want to weep, and I know that I cannot rest until Jayadratha's head falls on Vridhakshtra's lap. _I would rather jump onto a funeral pyre then spend another night and day on a world where Jayadratha draws breath._ As the sun is covered by the moon-and was not Abhimanyu as beautiful as the moon-it darkens and Jayadrath emerges from his tent, where the coward has been hiding.

"You great fool Arjuna" comes his voice, he has a harsh Sindhi accent, which I find myself hating irrationally "making a vow that would result in your own death, it's night fall and I am still living." He gloats, as he gloated after he abducted Draupadi, and I am furious that I allowed him to live after that.

"It is not Nightfall for me Jayadratha" I say as the sun reemerges from behind the moon "but for you" and I fire Pashupatastra and with a single stroke Jayadratha's head flies back off his neck into his tent. At that I hear Vridhakshtra's yelp in surprise, and I know that Abhimanyu has been avenged.

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